


The Adventure of the Tattooed Fighter

by ariadnes_string



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010), Sherlock Holmes (2009)
Genre: Crossover, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-22
Updated: 2012-12-08
Packaged: 2017-10-27 19:00:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 12,830
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/299007
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ariadnes_string/pseuds/ariadnes_string
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Who is he?” Watson asked.</p><p>“They call him the Tahitian,” Holmes replied, eyes fixed on the bout.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. one

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tailoredshirt](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tailoredshirt/gifts).



> This is an extremely late fic for the wonderful, patient, talented, generous tailored_shirt for her generous donation to help_brazil.

The man went down with a surprised _umph_. He didn’t get up. Standing over him, Holmes tilted his head, eyes narrowing with clinical interest. Then he shook his hair off his forehead and raised a hand in triumph.

Back just far enough from the ring to be inconspicuous, Watson smiled and gave himself a moment to appreciate the way Holmes’s muscles moved under the sheen of fight-sweat, the way victory lit up his face.

And then Holmes was gone and another set of fighters was bouncing around the ring, warming up.

“And now,” the master of ceremonies’ voice boomed, “we bring you, from the farthest reaches of the South Pacific, trained in ancient tribal arts of warfare—“

Watson lost the thread of the announcement as he felt a hand slip into the pocket of his trousers and a warm voice tickle his ear. “This should take care of next month’s rent.”

Following the hand with his own, Watson encountered the onionskin feel of banknotes.

“Much obliged, I’m sure, Old Cock. Nothing illegal, I hope.”

“Of course not. I merely had someone place a bet in your name.” Holmes sounded vaguely affronted.

“And did I bet on the right man?”

“Oh, I rather think you did.” Still in Watson’s pocket, the hand executed a slow slide towards the inside of his thigh.

Watson bumped at Holmes’s hip. “Shall we adjourn to a more congenial location to celebrate my winnings?”

“Mmm. Yes.” Holmes abruptly lost interest in the game. He dislodged his hand, crossed his arms, and faced the ring. “After this fight. The place has been buzzing about this chap all day.”

Watson peered down. One of the men in the ring was a boxing veteran, a butcher’s assistant from Whitechapel, with fists like hams and a face pocked by old acne scars. Burt—that was his name. Watson had relocated his shoulder once as a favor to Holmes and the man had stared straight ahead as though he’d been getting a plaster on a skinned knee.

There was no mystery about Burt. Holmes must mean the other man. Who was, now that Watson looked more closely, both new and exotic.

He was dark-haired and long-jawed, his skin a deep, even brown. Both biceps and the span of flesh at the base of his back were covered with intricate tattoos. Not the crude symbols and names that characterized the tattoos of Londoners and the sailors who passed through town, but abstract, multicolored designs, like the ones Watson sometimes glimpsed in Holmes’s collection of anthropological treatises. He was lean, this man, but muscled, and he danced away from Burt’s heavy blows with ease.

“Who is he?” Watson asked, interested despite himself.

“They call him the Tahitian,” Holmes replied, eyes fixed on the bout.

“Is that where he’s from?”

“No, I shouldn’t think so. The trainer who brought him in was American—I expect this fellow is, too.”

Watson squinted at the fighter. The tattoos, the beardless face, the long hair pulled back in a sailor’s queue, weren’t what he usually associated with Americans. But what did he know? It was a part of the world with which he was unfamiliar. Perhaps they all looked like that.

The Tahitian seemed to be landing twice as many blows as Whitechapel Burt, but that might have been simply because he was moving twice as fast. He was a skilled fighter, that much was clear, but there was something barely controlled, almost frenetic about his movements, and his face had started to turn a nasty brick red under the tan.

“Holmes,” Watson ventured, “do you think he’s quite well? He looks—“

“Oh yes, almost certainly drugged.” Holmes nodded, frowning. “Not that that should stop him from putting down poor old Burt.”

As if on cue, the Tahitian delivered a right hook to Burt’s jaw that sent the larger man crashing to the canvas. The referee counted over him while he flopped about helplessly, and then raised the Tahitian’s arm and declared him the winner. Burt’s trainer or manager or friend appeared and hauled him away while the Tahitian turned to the crowd, acknowledging the applause. And then kept on turning, a weirdly slow, off-balance spin. Quite suddenly, his knees gave out under him, and he crumpled to the ground.

Watson threw Holmes a glance. Holmes shrugged infinitesimally. And then they were shouldering their way through the crowd.

“I’m a doctor,” Watson said, elbowing a particularly thick onlooker aside.

By the time they’d slid under the ropes, however, another man was crouching over the fallen fighter, slapping him across the face in an effort to rouse him.

“Dr. John Watson.” Watson put a restraining hand on the man’s shoulder. “Perhaps I can be of assistance?”  
The crouching man threw him off. “Thanks but no thanks, doc. He’s okay.” He renewed his efforts with greater vigor. The Tahitian groaned faintly, but did not regain consciousness.

“I beg to differ.” Holmes put in, some steel in his tone. “This man needs medical attention. If you cannot rouse him we will be forced to summon an ambulance.”

The threat of official intervention did the trick. The man rose and faced them. He was thin as a lathe, in his mid-forties, salt-and-pepper hair close-cropped over a long, narrow skull. “Yeah, alright,” he said, his surliness accentuated by his nasal American vowels. “Do what you gotta do.”

He stepped back and let Watson and Holmes kneel on either side of the Tahitian’s prostrate form. Watson pressed his fingers under the man’s jaw, although it was hardly necessary: the pulse in this throat was almost visible to the naked eye, the veins were that close to the skin. Now that Watson was closer, he could see how thin the man was—the muscle the last remnant of a once-strong frame. His ribs pushed against the skin as his chest rapidly expanded and contracted.

Frowning, Watson ran his hands over the inside of the Tahitian’s elbows—the skin was hot and too easily pinched, but there were no needle marks.

“This man is dehydrated and malnourished,” he said, turning towards the American trainer, prepared to give him a tongue-lashing. But the man had disappeared.

As had most of the other patrons of the Punch Bowl. Watson couldn’t blame them. A man badly hurt meant possible police attention, and that was the last thing most of them wanted. He looked at Holmes.

“We need to cool him down and get some fluids in him before I can really assess his condition. I’m not sure he was drugged, after all.” He pointed to the man’s forearms.

Holmes smiled, a little sadly, it seemed to Watson, and pulled off the sock and shoe off the man’s left foot. There was an encrusted puncture mark between his toes. Watson hissed. The Tahitian’s skill might have been his own, but the speed and energy of his wasted frame had been entirely unnatural.

“Hospital?” Holmes asked.

“Not unless you want to bring the kind attentions of the Met down on the unwitting denizens of the Punch Bowl,” Watson said. “Bringing him in like this is bound to raise questions.”

“Baker Street, then,” said Holmes. “I have a few questions of my own.”

+++

They sacrificed Watson’s great coat to the cause of public decency and bundled the Tahitian into a Hansom.

“Drunk again,” said Holmes to the cabbie’s suspicious stare. The cabbie rolled his eyes and flicked the whip at his horses.

They were both panting by the time they’d manhandled the Tahitian onto the settee in Watson’s consulting room. The man had regained some consciousness, if no coherence, in the cab, but he returned to insensibility as soon as he was horizontal again. He was breathing stertorously, and shivering a bit even under Watson’s coat.

Sighing, Watson poured water from a pitcher into a basin, gave it to Holmes with a cloth, and surveyed his supply of smelling salts.

“As I suspected,” Holmes announced, holding up the cloth. It was smudged brown; a corresponding streak of pale skin across the Tahitian’s brow. His dark color, it appeared, was paint.

As Holmes continued to wipe the disguise away, the actual shade of the man’s complexion was revealed: a sallow pallor, dark and bruised-looking around the eyes. Holmes took an experimental swipe at the tattoos on the man’s left arm, but those, it seemed, were real.

“Of European descent after all,” Watson said softly. “I’m surprised he was able to fight at all, as ill as he looks.”

He held the vial of salts under the man’s nose—it would be easier to treat him if he were conscious, he’d decided. The Tahitian snorted, shook his head as if to get away; then his eyes snapped open, a surprisingly bright blue-green in his pale face.

His arms came up too, as if he were prepared to fight himself out of whatever situation he’d found himself in, but Holmes caught them easily enough.

“Steady on,” said Watson, a hand on the man’s chest. “I’m Dr. Watson and this is my colleague, Mr. Sherlock Holmes. You’re safe here.” The man fell back against the cushions, though whether from weakness or because he accepted their bonafides, Watson couldn’t tell.

“Can you tell us your name?” Holmes asked.

“Wai” the Tahitian croaked.

“What was that?” Holmes leaned closer to the man’s mouth, face sharp with interest.

“Wai,” the man tried again, almost pleading. He rubbed the base of his throat with his hand.

Holmes jumped to his feet. “Fascinating,” he said, and was out the door before Watson could protest.

Watson stared after him for a moment, annoyed. It was perfectly clear what the man was asking for, no need for any special research or deductions. He poured a glass of water and helped the Tahitian hold it to his lips.

“You must be very thirsty indeed, old chap,” Watson said as the man clutched at it, trying to gulp. “But take it slowly--small sips, that’s it.”

Halfway through their painstaking progress through the glass of water, Holmes reappeared, brandishing a leather-bound volume entitled _Indigenous Languages of the South Seas_.

“Wai” he said. “That’s “water” in Hawaiian. You’re from Hawaii, aren’t you?”

The fighter looked at him, half confused, half wary, but didn’t reply. Watson puzzled over the word; it conjured up green dots suspended in the endless blue Pacific of his schoolroom globe, pictures of topless natives in grass skirts. And something else: hadn’t Hawaii been in the papers a good deal lately? Some political upheaval involving the United States and possibly Great Britain? Though his own country hadn’t been involved in the end, he didn’t think. He squinted at his patient, hoping they weren’t about to get involved in some political brouhaha.

Holmes pressed on. “But you’re not Native Hawaiian, initial appearances to the contrary. So you must speak English as well. Can you tell us your name? Can you tell us how you ended up in London?”

The fighter shook his head, more as if he were trying to clear it than in denial, Watson thought. “They call me the Tahitian,” he said slowly. And then made further conversation impossible by sicking up the water Watson had just fed him in a miserable stream of yellow bile.

There followed several wearisome hours during which the Hawaiian, as Watson now supposed they ought to call him, retreated into a drug-induced semi-delirium, thrashing restlessly, resisting their attempts to clean him up and get more liquids into him, and muttering more words that Holmes gleefully translated with the aid of his enormous book. None of said words, however, gave them any further clues to the chain of events that had reduced him to this state.

“I suppose that explains the tattoos, though, if he is from Hawaii,” Watson said, searching the floor for pieces of the third broken glass of the evening. He was so tired himself that the shards seem to wink in and out of sight.

“Not really,” Holmes replied, head still hunched over his tome, ignoring Watson’s efforts to clean up. “Those aren’t Hawaiian designs—something from the Antipodes if I had to hazard a guess.”

“Please don’t,” said Watson.

Finally, Watson managed to rehydrate their guest to the point where he began to perspire freely and copiously. It seemed to be a relief. Soon thereafter, he stopped shivering and fell into a deep if obviously pain-ridden sleep.

“It’s the best thing for him,” Watson declared, wiping down the man’s face. “I don’t think there’s much wrong besides exhaustion and general mistreatment. If his body can rid itself whatever drug they’ve pumped into him, he may be more coherent and less hostile when he wakes up.”

“Shall we keep watch over him?” Holmes asked, in rare deferral to Watson’s medical skill.

“I shouldn’t think so,” Watson said, suddenly heartily sick of boxing and drugs and faraway tropical islands. “He’s well and truly out now, and he’ll be warm enough here. I’ll check on him in an hour or so.” He arranged the Hawaiian on his side and tucked a blanket around him. Then he stifled a yawn and dropped his hand on Holmes’s head, tangled his fingers in his thick hair. “Besides—there’s the unfinished business of celebrating my winnings.”

+++

Watson awoke to the unmistakable click of a door and the sound of feet on the stairs. With a jolt, he remembered the mysterious man in his consulting rooms. He’d meant to look in on him, but clearly hadn’t done so in time. He started to rise, but a heavy weight pinned him to the bed.

“Budge up,” he said, shoving at Holmes. “Our guest is on the move.”

They’d fallen asleep in a tangle of limbs so infernal it actually took a minute to figure out whose leg was whose. Then Watson was shoving his feet into his trousers and Holmes was pulling his dressing gown around his shoulders and they were stumbling downstairs to where the front door swung on its hinges.

Outside, they were greeted by the gray light and bustle of a London morning, but no sign whatsoever of their Hawaiian.

“I’m sorry,” Watson said, spinning on his heels in pure fury at himself. “I wouldn’t have thought he was in any shape to go anywhere—much less so quickly.”

“Not your fault, old boy.” Holmes clapped him heartily on the shoulder, though his tone was bleak. “Some drugs can produce a powerful need—one that overrides mere physical discomfort.”

“ _Mister_ Holmes,” said Mrs. Hudson, when they re-entered the house, taking in the extreme impropriety of his attire.

“Quite so, my good woman,” Holmes replied. “Quite so. Tea, please, as soon as you can manage it. And extra toast.”

+++

“We should go after him,” Watson said. He had washed and dressed, and was now shaving somewhat haphazardly in front of the small mirror in his room, a cup of cooling tea at his elbow. “He was in a bad way, poor man. Whoever had him in his keeping was clearly abusive—and he might be doing the same to others.”

“I quite agree,” Holmes replied, from his sprawl on Watson’s bed. “I’ll go back to the Punch Bowl in a bit. I’m sure they’ve cleared out by now, but someone might know something.”

Just then, the sound of a commotion reached them from the ground floor.

“Sir,” Mrs. Hudson was saying in the exasperated tones of a woman who was having a distinctly unpleasant morning, “I’ll tell you again, Mr. Holmes is not at home—certainly not to the likes of you. And I’ll thank you to stop waving that thing in my face.”

Thudding footsteps on the stairs indicated that the personage had paid no heed to her words. Rushing into the sitting room, Holmes and Watson found themselves staring down the barrel of a Colt revolver.

“Alright,” demanded a very loud and very American voice, “what’ve you two cocksuckers done with him?”

“Done with whom?” Holmes asked with superbly manufactured innocence.

“McGarrett. Don’t fuck with me, you fuckers. What have you done with McGarrett?”

The man at the other end of the Colt was short, blond and rumpled. In his mid-thirties, he wore a black peacoat and heavy boots. Splendid mutton-chop whiskers dominated a face that would have been handsome if it hadn’t been so contorted with worry and rage.

“My good sir,” Holmes gestured mildly at the Colt, while Watson calculated how many steps it would take him to reach the poker by the fireplace. “Mrs. Hudson is quite right. You can put that down. Your friend McGarrett, if that is his name, was here. But he left early this morning. Under his own power, we believe, but not, sadly, in full possession of his faculties. We were just thinking how to begin our own search for him. Perhaps you could sit down, have some tea, and tell us a bit more about him? In your own inimitable colonial manner, of course,” he added graciously.

The blond man squinted at him, as if he didn’t quite know if he’d been welcomed or insulted. He made a quick search of the flat and circled back to them. Wiping his forehead with his wrist on the way down, he lowered the gun. He looked tired, Watson thought. As if he hadn’t slept the night before. Or perhaps for many nights before that.

“Yeah, alright, why not? I’ve tried just about everything else.” The man sat heavily on the sofa and waved his gun at them. “Just don’t try any funny business.”

“We wouldn’t dream of it,” said Holmes. “Mr.—?”

“Williams,” said the man, accepting a cup of tea and trying unsuccessfully to balance it on his knee. “Officer Daniel Williams of the Honolulu Police Force. And don’t think I don’t know who you are, Mr. Holmes. They told me some good stories about you down at the Punch Bowl.”

“I’m sure they did,” Holmes said with a smile that indicated he believed all tales told about him were flattering. “And your friend, Mr. McGarrett?”

“Lt. Commander Stephen J. McGarrett, Naval Intelligence, recently seconded to the HPF, in light of the recent upheavals our city has undergone.”

Here it comes, Watson thought with an inner groan, the politics. “You do know,” he said aloud, “that when we brought Commander McGarrett here last night, exhausted and ill, he would only identify himself as the Tahitian.”

“I know.” Officer Williams looked up, such sadness in his blue eyes that Watson almost flinched. “They told me as much at the boxing joint.”

“How did that happen?” Holmes asked gently. “Can you tell us?”

“Yeah.” Williams slumped a bit and took a swallow of tea, grimacing at the cup as if he wished it were something else. “I suppose it can’t do any harm to tell you what I can, seeing how you’ve gone out of your way to help Steve already.” He cleared his throat. “The thing you gotta understand is: I’m not from Hawaii.”

“Yes,” said Holmes, who had now taken up a seat opposite Williams and was peering at him intently, chin on his steepled hands. “You’re from New Jersey. Somewhere near Patterson, if I’m not mistaken.”

“How did you--?” Williams looked startled, but shook his head and went on with his tale. “So, yeah, I moved out to the islands about three years ago—domestic entanglements, y’know? Place is a pineapple infested shithole but it kept me near my little girl. You fellas have children?” Holmes and Watson shook their heads. “Well, you wouldn’t understand then, but nothing else mattered to me except for that.”

Watson peered at him: the man was rambling, evidently even more tired than he looked. None of this seemed relevant to the plight of the fighter they’d brought home last night.

Holmes seemed to be thinking the same thing. “And Commander McGarrett?”

“Right.” Williams visibly pulled himself together. “Well, Honolulu was never what you’d call a boring place, but leading up the Annexation in ’98, shit really started to hit the fan—suddenly we were up to our eyeballs in political plots on top of all the regular robbing and murdering. So the Territorial Governor told the Navy as long as they were sitting out there in the harbor they’d better pitch in and help. And they sent us Steve—Commander McGarrett. Who is a crazy person, don’t get me wrong—spent most of his career on lunatic spy missions in the Philippines—hear we might have a war there too, soon—and points south—went a little native, too, if you believe the stories, and I sure as heck do. But he knows Hawaii—grew up there, son of the overseer for one of those giant plantations—knows how things work. So, long story short, he’s a loose cannon, but things got a whole lot easier with him onboard.”

“So is that what this is?” Watson interjected with a sinking feeling. “A spy mission gone wrong?”

“Nah.” Williams shook his head. “Almost wish it were, then the government would have to lend a hand. This is just your-run-of-the-mill people moving operation that’s taken a nasty turn. One of the gangs that brings in coolie labor—not even Chinamen in this case, just local haoles—that’s white men, to you—decided they’d bring some talent back on the return trip—bring them back without their say so, if you know what I mean. Street fighters they could make money off in Shanghai, some high-class whores. Didn’t do more than raise a few eyebrows. Then they made the mistake of kidnapping the Chief Justice’s mistress—well, she used to be a high class whore, so it was an honest mistake—but still, not the kind of thing you can do with impunity in Honolulu. The Chief Justice called the governor, the governor called us—me and Steve and a couple of other fellows, we’re always on call for special assignments. And the next thing I know, Steve’s rushing in like he always does, leaving me a note saying he’s got a lead on the boss—Clemmons, we think he’s called.”

“And then?” Holmes prompted. Watson felt a step or two behind, trying to remember what he knew of the coolie trade.

“And then you tell me.” Williams sagged, looking thoroughly disheartened. “That was the last I heard from him. By dawn Clemmons’s ship had sailed, no Chief Justice’s mistress, no Steve.”

“And so you followed him? You tracked him all the way across the Atlantic?” Watson asked, suddenly touched by the man’s devotion.

“Atlantic?” Williams stared at him. “Just where do you think Hawaii is? Followed them across the goddamn Pacific to Shanghai, but I lost a couple of days there to some local fever, and by the time I was up and about again the trail was cold. Most I could find out was that Clemmons had decided to do a European tour with his best fighters, so I set off overland—Orient Express most of the way. Thought I’d caught up with them in Bucharest, but they slipped away. I won’t bore you with the details, but next thing I know, it’s two months later and here I am—one step behind as usual.”

“You really are the thousandth man,” Watson said.

Williams wrinkled his brow. “Hmm? It’s just _ohana_ , y’know? That’s what they say in Hawaii, anyway.”

“Family,” Holmes translated.

“Yeah.” Williams reached for his teacup with an unsteady hand but managed to overturn it. Hot liquid splashed his trouser leg and he leapt to his feet, cursing and apologizing alternately.

“My good man,” said Watson, “No apologies necessary, you must be completely done in.” He opened the door and called downstairs. “Mrs. Hudson, will you be so kind as to bring up some sandwiches for our guest? Thank you.”

Below, she muttered, “Guest? So it’s a guest now, is it?” but he could hear her stamping off towards the kitchen.

“And Holmes, perhaps you could find Detective Williams some brandy? I know it’s early, but it’ll do him good.”

Holmes startled, as if he’d been pursuing some internal line of inquiry, then moved to find the decanter.

Williams downed the brandy like a shot of whisky, making a satisfied noise at the back of his throat. Then he set to ravenously on the sandwiches Mrs. Hudson disapprovingly delivered. Midway through the third one, however, he frowned, rubbed his fingers across his forehead, leaned back in his chair and fell asleep, mouth open and a sandwich still dangling from his hand.

Watson studied him. The man was clearly even more exhausted than he had thought; or, perhaps he was suffering from some illness or injury not immediately apparent; or—

“Holmes,” Watson said sternly, “did you by any chance tamper with our friend’s drink?”

Holmes looked up from the stack of books on the Pacific Islands he’d brought down from shelves. For a moment, he seemed to consider evading the question. Then he gestured dismissively at Watson’s concern.

“Of course I did. Look at him. We can’t have him running about London like a bull in a china shop. He’d scare away any sources just by walking into a room. This way, I can do some reconnaissance unimpeded, and he can get some much needed rest.”

“And what I am supposed to do with him?” Watson jabbed a finger at the now snoring Detective Williams.

“Why keep an eye on him, my dear,” Holmes said chidingly. “You saw what happened when we let the other one out of our sight.”

+++

Williams awoke three hours later with a sharp snort and a long groan. He swung his feet off the sofa where Watson had carefully arranged them and dragged a hand through his already disheveled hair.

“Whoa.” He fixed a bleary eye on Watson, who sat in the chair opposite, perusing the evening paper. “That English brandy sure packs a punch. Or—hey—“ He scratched at his whiskers and squinted. “You fellas didn’t slip me a mickey, didja?”

“Hmm?” Watson folded his paper and tried to look suitably disingenuous. “I’m not sure what you mean, old chap. You were simply exhausted from your travels, and we thought it best to let you rest.”

“Hmpf.” Williams didn’t seem convinced, but he stretched and looked around for his boots. “Where’s the other one—the detective fellow?”

“Mr. Holmes has gone to make further inquiries about your friend , McGarrett. He should return shortly.”

“And left you here to make sure I didn’t pull a fast one, eh?” Williams gave Watson a knowing glance. He was evidently cannier than his blowhard manner would lead one to expect.

Watson ignored the question. “Perhaps you’d care to use the, uh, facilities while we wait, Officer Williams?” he said, not entirely graciously.

But Williams laughed. “Call me Danny, everyone does. And that’s mighty kind of you, Johnny—I sure must stink. You don’t mind if I call you Johnny, do ya?”

Watson certainly did mind. But he was caught between Danny’s American informality and his own ingrained English politeness. So he merely raised his eyebrows and said, “The bath’s just down the hall—second door on your right.”

Before Danny could leave the room, however, the door was pushed open with the vigorous poke of a cane. A pink-cheeked, white-whiskered old man followed in its wake. He was stooped but spry, wearing a plain but serviceable black suit. He cocked his head inquiringly at the scene in front of him.

Danny gaped for a moment, then stuck out his hand, seemingly determined to make the best of things. “Pleased to meet you, sir. Johnny didn’t tell me his pa lived here, too.”

“Johnny?” The old man appeared on the verge of succumbing to a fit of extremely undignified giggles. “You’ll have to pardon him; never the most polite of lads, our Johnny.”

Watson lost the last shreds of his patience. “Oh, honestly. Straighten up and let us know what you found. And give me back my cane.”

With a slight pout, Holmes rose to his full height, pulling off the white beard as he did so. He held the cane out to Watson like a peace offering. Danny’s mouth dropped open for a moment, but he recovered with admirable rapidity.

“Neat trick,” he noted dryly. “But did you find Steve?”

“No luck, I’m afraid, old son,” Holmes said, pausing in front of the mantelpiece mirror to work the white mustache off his face. “The whole crew has cleared out. Only to be expected with the police threat raised by last night’s goings on.”

“Then I’ve missed them again.” Danny sunk onto the sofa with a deflated sigh.

“Ah,” said Holmes smugly. “But you underestimate the persuasive power of a humble tailor seeking only to have to have his bill paid.”

Danny’s head snapped up again. “You—“

“Why yes,” Holmes fairly preened. “It seems that the humble tailor is not the only one whose demands for payment have gone unheeded. Your Mr. Clemmons is something of a profligate, as it turns out, and more powerful creditors than the tailor have been clamoring for his funds. And so, his merry band of drugged fighters is effectively marooned in London until he can pay at least some of these debts—presumably by staging another fight or two.”

“And so—“ Danny breathed.

“And so, while the Punch Bowl is, as you Americans say, too hot for him, he has merely gone to ground deeper in the city’s nether regions, your friend Commander McGarrett in tow.”

“Holmes,” Watson interjected, “Did you manage to figure where this foxhole of theirs is?”

“It took a bit of doing,” Holmes admitted, “and the aid of the Irregulars, but I think I’ve located a house in Billingsgate that they may be using.” Restored more or less to his ordinary face, he rounded the sofa and clapped Danny on the shoulder. “And so tonight we shall shut down whatever dirty game they’ve been playing.”

Somewhat unexpectedly, however, Danny refused to be comforted by Holmes’s words. “No,” he said sticking an imperative finger in Holmes’s face. “I want Steve out of there before you call the law down on these bastards. I want him away and out of danger.”

“But what difference does it make?” Watson asked. “He won’t be held responsible for anything he’s done under their influence. He’s a victim here.”

Danny smiled grimly, “Better not let him hear you use that word, Johnny. But first, because I don’t want him thrown in jail while they sort things out, like you know they’re gonna do, not if he’s in the state you say he’s in; and second, because I know him and he won’t leave without Annalee—that’s the Chief Justice’s mistress who started this whole mess. See any sign of her in your investigations, Sherlock?”

“Holmes, please, if you don’t mind,” said Holmes mildly. “And no, I’m afraid I didn’t.”

“Well, then, Mr. Holmes, here’s what we’re gonna do.” Danny stood and sketched things out for them with his hands, seemingly unaware that no one told Holmes to follow a plan that wasn’t his. “We go in; we get Steve; we dry him out; we find the lady in question; and then, only then, do we bring in the local cops.”

Holmes, to Watson’s surprise, seemed unperturbed by this highhandedness. “Are you proposing, Officer Williams, that we kidnap your friend back from the blackguards who’ve kidnapped him?”

“That’s exactly what I am proposing.”

Holmes threw a tight, companionable arm around Danny’s neck and squeezed, while Watson looked on in astonishment. “Then you and I,” he said, “will get on famously.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And so it was, that as the clock edged towards midnight, Watson found himself in an establishment that made the Punch Bowl look like Windsor Castle.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Set in some vague era before the first movie. About as realistic in most regards as the Ritchie films. This chapter is un-beta'd; all mistakes are my own.
> 
> a/n: I've borrowed a few lines form H50 2x01.  
> a/n: To my knowledge, there were no pirates off the coast of Newfoundland in 1899-1900.

And so it was, that as the clock edged towards midnight, Watson found himself in an establishment that made the Punch Bowl look like Windsor Castle, watching a series of ragged fighters battle it out in low stakes bouts. Holmes was disguised again, in a sea captain’s beard and hat that hid his face, Watson and Danny, less well-known to the fighting community, were in their own persons. Not that it mattered, Watson thought: most of the punters were too inebriated to recognize their own mothers, let alone a consulting detective. It was difficult to even keep their place in the heaving sea of wet wool and alcohol fumes.

The Tahitian, as McGarrett was still billed, fought twice. He looked, if anything, worse than he had the night before, his debility visible even under the reapplied paint. Danny made a sound like wolf’s snarl when he saw him for the first time, and Watson, without thinking, put a restraining hand on his arm, felt the muscles flex, relax and flex again under his palm.

“Tonight,” Watson whispered. “We’ll get him out tonight.”

McGarrett’s movements were jerkier and more manic that they’d been at the Punch Bowl, but his intrinsic speed and skill still won him both his fights. Most of Clemmons’s other fighters weren’t so lucky, plowed down by the sheer meanness of London toughs. Holmes, Watson and Danny waited it out, though it made grim viewing.

When things finally wound down, they exited into the inky night and waited for the ragged band of fighters to appear. Clemmons had seen fit to hire a cart to take his crew back to their bolt hole, but the thing trundled so slowly along the narrow streets that it was an easy matter to stick to the shadows and follow it.

Barely a half mile away, the cart pulled up in front of a ramshackle tenement, and Clemmons herded his men inside, most of them stumbling or limping, arms holding battered torsos or heads. In the dark alley across the street, Holmes held conference with the urchin he’d set watching the place that afternoon.

“How many?” he asked. “Aside from the fighters.”

“Two,” said the lad, eyes sharp in his dirty face. “Two bully-boys plus Himself and the four bruisers. ‘Less there’s more in there that ain’t never come out. Can’t say about that.”

“Ladies?” Danny put in. “You see any ladies go in or out?”

The boy solemnly shook his head.

“And what floor are they presently inhabiting?” Holmes asked.

“Top two, sir.”

“Good lad.” Holmes handed him a coin, which the boy unceremoniously tested between his teeth. “There’s another of those for you if you stay the course as we discussed.”

“What now?” asked Watson, as the Irregular faded into the shadows from whence he’d come.

“Now, you two keep watch,” Holmes said. “I’ll be back.”

“Holmes—“ said Danny. But he was already gone.

+++

They had barely smoked a cigarette apiece when the stillness was broken by the clatter of wheels and hooves. They startled, then relaxed.

“Just a milk cart,” Watson said. “It must be later—earlier—than I thought.”

Then the milk cart pulled to a stop in front of them, and Holmes jumped out. He’d shed his sailor’s get-up and somehow acquired a milkman’s long coat and cap.

“How—”

“Just borrowing it,” Holmes said dismissively. “Promised to get it back by the morning run. Here—“ He took off the coat and cap and thrust them at Watson. “Ring the bell—make a distraction—a stink about the bill or something. I’m sure he owes money for everything.”

“And you—?“ Watson reluctantly took the cap. He hated it when Holmes’s schemes demanded playacting on his part.

“My American friend and I,” Holmes grabbed Danny’s shoulder, “are going to make our way to the upper floors by other means. If you’re game, that is?”

“I’m game,” said Danny grimly.

“Watson, I’ll need that syringe.” Holmes held out his hand.

Watson pulled the leather case out of the inner pocket of his coat. “Use it only if you need to,” he cautioned. “And only on McGarrett.”

“Of course,” Holmes said, rather too glibly. 

Holmes gestured to Danny, proceeded several steps towards the building, and then suddenly froze, eyes going blank and inward.

“What’s he doing?” Danny hissed.

“Thinking,” said Watson.

Danny gave what Watson had already learned to think of as his characteristic snort. “If Steve was here, he’d drive that milk cart right through the front door.”

Watson blinked. He was beginning to think that a _compos mentis_ Commander McGarrett might be quite an interesting person to know. 

Holmes snapped out of his reverie and gestured impatiently to Danny. They disappeared into the dark spaces between the buildings.

Watson swapped his coat for the milkman’s and shoved the cap onto his head. With a muttered curse on the name of Sherlock Holmes, he knocked sharply on the front door. And then knocked again. After a third set of knocks as loud as he could make them, a hulking beaver-browed man cracked open the door.

“Yeh?” 

Watson pulled whatever papers he could find out of the milkman’s coat’s pocket—they might’ve been the man’s grocery list for all he knew—and waved them in Beaver Brow’s face. “Late,” he blustered. “Five pints of milk every morning, and I haven’t seen a farthing. I should have the law on you, I should. Pay up, sir.”

The giant’s face creased with confusion. “Eh? What’re you on about? There ain’t no one ‘ere ‘oo drinks milk.”

Watson imagined he heard the muted sounds of struggle from above; he raised his voice accordingly to cover them. “No one here drinks milk, my Uncle Albert’s hairy arse. Someone at this address has been guzzling my Maisie’s finest for a fortnight, and I’m here for what’s owed me.”

Despite his size, Beaver Brows seemed cowed by Watson’s invective, screwing up his face in what appeared to be an effort to figure out who the milk guzzler might be.

Watson pressed his advantage. “I’ll have the law on you, I will,” he said, jabbing a finger close to the man’s chest.

The man was still trying to decide how best to counter this threat when the ruckus assumed physical form: Danny barreling down the stairs supporting a barely conscious McGarrett, followed by Holmes, looking over his shoulder and leveling a pistol at any would-be pursuers.

“What’s this?” demanded Beaver Brows. “Thought you’d trick me, did you? You miserable piece of—“ 

He launched himself forward, but Watson got his cane between them in time, pressing the man far enough backwards against the doorframe that Danny and McGarrett were able to slip by. Then a faintly ridiculous shoving match commenced, one that Beaver Brows seemed destined to win, if only by virtue of his greater weight and height.

Until, out of the corner of his eye, Watson saw a hand jab something silvery into Beaver Brow’s neck. Almost instantly, the man’s face slackened and his limbs relaxed. With a confused grunt, he collapsed across the doorway.

“Holmes,” Watson said, annoyed. “That was medical grade morphine. I told you not to waste it.”

“Later, old son, later,” Holmes said, hopping neatly over the man’s body. “Step lively now.”

+++

Watson pulled himself into the driver’s seat and gathered the reins, whilst Holmes and Danny slung McGarrett into the bed of the milk wagon, bottles rolling madly out of the way. 

A night-shirted Clemmons, another lackey and several sleepy-looking fighters spilled into the street after them, yelling and gesticulating. They fell back quickly, though, when Holmes fired a shot in the air. Goodness knew what the neighbors would think of that, though in this corner of London it might not even merit breakfast conversation. Out of the corner of his eye, Watson saw Holmes’s young watcher poke his head out from between two buildings and quickly draw it in again.

“Drive like the wind, Watson,” Holmes yelled, with his characteristic melodrama. “Drive like the wind!”

“Fat chance of that, with these glue factory rejects,” Watson muttered, as he tried to goad the horses into some semblance of a trot. 

He steered southwest out of the city. They’d decided earlier that bringing McGarrett back to Baker Street again would be unwise. Watson had sent a message by runner to an old Army friend who owned a public house outside of Greenwich, telling him a fellow soldier was in need of a quiet place to dry out for a day or two. Former Staff Sergeant Joseph Bunn had promised to have a room or two ready for them whenever they arrived.

It was close to dawn now, and traffic was picking up. It took all of Watson’s concentration to keep the wagon from bumping into similar conveyances or running over pedestrians nearly invisible in the early morning gloom. He startled when Holmes tapped his shoulder.

“Not now,” he said, shrugging him off and twitching the horses sharply to the left to avoid hitting a girl with a cage of chickens on her head.

Holmes tapped again, more urgently.

“Can’t you see I’m trying to keep us from toppling over? Really, Holmes, if you were going to steal something, I don’t know why you couldn’t have gone for something a bit more maneuverable.”

“Borrowed,” Holmes corrected mildly. “And I think you’ll want to give me the reins now, old chap, Commander McGarrett requires your attention.”

Watson risked a look at him. “Why? What’s happened?”

“I’m no doctor,” Holmes conceded, almost apologetically. “But he appears to be experiencing quite strong convulsions.”

“Oh, bloody hell.”

+++

Exchanging the reins with the horses in mid-trot was a tricky business, and clambering from the driver’s seat into the enclosed back of the wagon was trickier still. Watson unloosed more than one volley of oaths before he arrived at where Danny crouched next to McGarrett, his face twisted with worry.

“Do something for him, Doc,” he pleaded.

Watson surveyed the scene. McGarrett was rigid and trembling hard, his head thrown back at an awful angle, the whites of his eyes showing, flecks of white foam on his lips. 

“I’m sorry, old boy,” said Watson, with a sympathetic squeeze of Danny’s shoulder. “Not much we can do, I’m afraid. Except make sure he doesn’t break one of these bottles and cut himself. And perhaps get something between his teeth so he won’t bite his own tongue.”

Clearing the space proved more difficult than he’d imagined. The wagon veered haphazardly from one side of the road to the other, Holmes yelling, “Oi, there,” and “Watch it,” in increasingly annoyed tones. In the end, they forgot about the bottles and just held onto McGarrett, trying to keep him from sliding too wildly along the lurching floor. Luckily, the fit, though violent, was brief, and McGarrett subsided into semi-consciousness before he could do himself further injury.

“He’ll be cold,” Watson said, slipping out of his coat and gesturing for Danny to do the same. Soon, they had McGarrett wrapped in both, anchored securely by Danny’s arms . He was still beyond speech, but Watson thought he saw a gleam of recognition as he looked into his friend’s face.

+++

A bright, blustery day had dawned by the time they pulled into the stables of the Khyber Pass pub. They found Mr. and Mrs. Bunn busy in the pub’s kitchen as they more or less carried McGarrett in through the service entrance.

“Ah, doctor,” said Mr. Bunn, a tall, heavily built man with a dour face he showed to Afghan tribesmen and drunken punters alike. “This the poor bugger? Bit the worse for wear, eh?”

“That he is, Bunny, that he is,” Watson agreed, giving Mr. Bunn a clap on the shoulder in greeting. “Do you have a few rooms for us while we sober him up?”

“Aye. Sarah, can you show Doctor Watson where he can install his unfortunate companion?”

But Mrs. Bunn had been studying McGarrett’s stained brown skin and long black queue. “He’s never an Englishman, that one,” she said, crossing her arms over her impressive bosom and pursing her lips.

“Acutely observed, my good woman,” said Holmes. He leaned forward as if imparting a state secret. “He’s an American. That one, too.” He jerked his chin in Danny’s direction. Danny waggled his eyebrows.

Sarah Bunn jumped a little, her hand flying to her mouth. She regained her composure quickly, though. “Hmph,” she said, as if the national designation explained everything. 

+++

Despite her initial disapproval, however, Mrs. Bunn proved a wise and generous nurse. Once she saw how ill Mcgarrett really was, she helped get him out of his tattered fighter’s rags and into one of the inn’s admirable feather beds, barely batting an eye as his tattoos were revealed She brought water and clean towels and let Watson take what he needed from her small store of remedies. 

“How bad is he, doc?” asked Danny, hovering at Watson’s elbow as he tried to make a thorough examination.

“Not nearly as badly off as he might be, given what he’s been through. He’ll suffer as the drug leaves his system—fever, nausea, more mild seizures if we’re unlucky—but I’m hopeful there won’t be any lasting effects. His constitution seems remarkably sound.”

Danny made a strangled sound that might have been the beginnings of hysterical laughter. “So he’s always telling me.”

Watson wondered for a moment whether he should prescribe a sedative for Danny as well, the man seemed suddenly close to breaking. Even his side-whiskers were drooping with exhaustion. 

“We’d best keep a close watch on your friend,” he said, “given the events of the night before last. I’ll take the first shift—you could use some sleep.

“No.” Danny shook his head firmly, his steady demeanor returning. “I’ll stay. You get some rest.”

The offer was tempting. Watson could feel weariness pulling at him, now that the night’s excitement had passed. But Danny was in the same boat, and lacked experience in nursing. “Are you sure? It may not be pretty.”

Danny nodded. “You fellows have done enough for us already. Besides,” he cast an unabashedly fond look at the unconscious McGarrett, “me and him have some catching up to do—been a while since we seen each other.”

+++

Watson found Holmes in the room across the hall, sitting cross-legged on the bed with his hands steepled under his chin. 

He opened his eyes at the sound of the door closing. “How does our erstwhile Tahitian?”

Watson shrugged. “We’ll know more by evening. None the worse for being reunited with his friend, I’m sure.”

He paused at the sound of his own words, his hands halfway through unbuttoning his collar. A strange storm of images assaulted him: Holmes lost to him for months; Holmes thin and ragged in a bare-knuckle fighting den; Holmes lying insensible on strange sheets in a foreign land. Before he knew it, he had one knee up on the bed and his hands on Holmes’ shoulders—just testing, just making sure that he was there, living, warm to the touch.

“I say,” Holmes protested, but he seemed to catch some of Watson’s urgency, because he tilted his face towards Watson’s kiss, returned the pressure of his lips, and burrowed his fingers into Watson’s hair.

How long they stayed like that, Watson couldn’t have said, so lost was he in the clear, beautiful reality of Holmes’s presence. Things had just reached a point where the removal of clothing had begun to seem a necessity, however, when someone rapped sharply on the door and then opened it without waiting for an answer.

“Oh,” said Danny, as Watson fairly leapt from the bed. “Pardon me.” 

“What is it?” Watson frantically tucked his shirt back into his trousers. “Is he worse?”

Danny shook his head, looking bemused. “The opposite, really. He woke up, puked a few times, and now he’s asking for you two. Whenever you’re ready, that is.” Danny pulled his head back through the door, giving them a mischievous grin as he left. “Don’t mind me, boys. You don’t spend two months on a Pacific tramp steamer without seeing a lot of the world, if you catch my drift. Live and let live, that’s what I say.” He gave them a knowing wink, and shut the door behind him.

Watson sagged in relief, while Holmes gave a short, pleased bark of laughter. 

+++

Remarkable as it seemed, McGarrett was indeed awake: propped up on pillows and looking incongruously fierce in Mr. Bunn’s spare nightshirt. Danny perched beside him, one hand on his knee, the other raised as if to physically restrain McGarrett from leaving the bed. Watson wondered what had passed between them when McGarrett had awakened to find himself reunited with his long-lost friend. At the moment, they looked furious with each other.

“Good to see you awake, Commander McGarrett,” he said, shooing Danny away so he could check McGarrett’s pulse and temperature: both still slightly elevated, but cogency had clearly returned to his blue-green eyes.

McGarrett ignored him. “You’re letting him get away,” he said, eyes angrily moving from Holmes to Watson and back again. “Clemmons: you can’t let him get away with this.” 

His voice was rough and oddly-accented to Watson’s ears, but impressively commanding, given the circumstances. He shifted as if to rise, and Watson placed a restraining hand on his chest. 

“On the contrary,” Holmes assured him. “I have my best watcher on him—with instructions to follow the party if they move out, or to alert Scotland Yard once we know for sure that Miss Annalee Sneyd is not with him.”

McGarrett regarded him dubiously, but fell back against the pillows again, clearly too exhausted for further protest. “She’s not,” he said, mouth tightening to a bitter line.

They all looked at him expectantly.

“I’ve been lying here trying to piece it together,” McGarrett said, his voice sounding more strained with every word. Watson wanted to tell him not to try and speak, but he doubted it would do much good. “And near as I can figure out, Clemmons sold her.”

“Good God,” Watson exclaimed involuntarily, even as Holmes leaned forward and said, “but how do you know?”

“It happened in the first place we stayed when we got to London. Not the one you got me from—a nicer place than that. They—well, they kept all us fighters pretty well under. Drugged, I guess. So I knew what was going on, but I couldn’t do anything about it.” 

Watson could tell how painful this was for McGarrett to relate from the way his body stiffened on the bed. But his voice was steady. Even if Danny hadn’t told them of his military past, Watson would have known from this. He’d seen this kind of discipline to many times before: all personal feeling banished in order to accomplish a mission.

“Annalee was with us,” McGarrett continued. “The whole way from Shanghai to London. She used to come visit me sometimes—to check on me, I guess, once she knew Clemmons had me, too. Sometimes she’d bring me food. I couldn’t really—I mean, I wasn’t enough of myself to—but she seemed to understand. Anyway, she did the same when we got to London.” 

He paused, and Watson took the opportunity to pour a glass of water from the pitcher next to the bed and help him take a few shaky sips. McGarrett smiled his thanks, and dug the heel of his free palm into his eyes like he was still trying to clear his head.

“Clemmons and his goons and the ladies had the ground floor of this place. He stuck the fighters in the basement. But my bed was under this slit of the window. And I guess I used to lie there most of the day, watching people’s feet go by. Then, one day, I don’t know how long ago, maybe a week, maybe two, I saw Annalee’s feet—I knew they were hers—she was wearing these high-heeled shoes with feathers she told me she got made special by this old lady in Oahu. It was so unusual to see her outside that it cut through whatever fog I was in. I pulled myself out of bed and got as close to the window as I could. And there were Annalee’s feet, getting into one of those fancy one-horse carriages.”

“A brougham,” Holmes supplied.

“I guess. I don’t know. Anyway, it was a closed carriage, so I couldn’t see who else was in there with her—just Clemmons kind of pushing her in, and a hand coming out with a wallet or envelope for him. And that’s was it. Annalee didn’t visit me anymore. And me? I was too far gone to hardly notice.” 

McGarrett pressed his lips together and turned his head away. At Watson’s shoulder, Danny unloosed a soft, sympathetic stream of curses.

Holmes, however, was like a dog that had been handed a particularly tasty bone. “A brougham, you say. Did it have any markings, on the door or side?”

McGarrett turned towards him, surprised out of his misery. “Yeah, now that you mention it, it might’ve. A seal maybe, or a crest.”

“Could you describe it? Draw it, perhaps?”

McGarrett visibly searched his memory. “It’s a little fuzzy—like everything else. But yeah, maybe.”

Holmes flung open the door. “Mr. Bunn, a pencil and paper if you will,” he shouted imperiously.

Watson hurried out into the hall and called in his most placating tone, “And if you could bring up some beef broth as well, we’d greatly appreciate it.” 

When he returned, Danny had taken his place on the bed, murmuring something with his head so close to McGarrett’s that Watson couldn’t catch the words. He let them be.

Moments later, both Bunns burst into the room, obviously eager to see what was causing the excitement. Mr. Bunn held a shopkeeper’s yellow pad and the stub of a pencil, and Mrs. Bunn carried a tray laden with a steaming bowl, tea, and biscuits.

“Now then,” said Holmes, grabbing the writing implements and crouching next to the bed. “Take your time—just sketch what you can remember.”

All four of them hovered over him as McGarrett started to draw with shaky fingers. The shape of a shield came first, bisected by a diagonal line. “Here,” he said, pointing to the upper half of the shape. “There was the head of something. A horse, maybe. Or a big dog.” He drew a circle, with a something vaguely muzzle-like sticking out of one side. “And down here there were a bunch of small shapes—I’m not sure what they were.” 

They all peered at the picture, disappointed at the lack of detail. Then Mrs. Bunn said, “Joe—it looks like. Well, if that were a mastiff’s head—and those shapes down there were those flying bird things—five of ‘em—it could be Lord Raeburn’s crest, couldn’t it?”

“Aye,” agreed Mr. Bunn. “I suppose it could.”

“Could it have been a mastiff?” Holmes asked. McGarrett nodded slowly, something vengeful kindling in his eyes. “Who’s Lord Raeburn?” Holmes asked the Bunns. 

“Lives nearby,” Mr. Bunn told him. “Hudders Park—about three miles east of here. His staff come in sometimes on their days off. What’s he got to do with your American friend, though?”

It seemed too complicated to manufacture a story, so Holmes gave them a barebones version of the truth—one that began with McGarrett and Annalee being kidnapped from Hawaii and held captive in the London underworld and concluded with Danny following them across the Pacific.

“Oo,” said Mrs. Bunn halfway through, “it’s like a novel—Robert Louis Stevenson or something.”

“Hush, woman,” said Mr. Bunn.

“And now,” Holmes concluded, “If it is Lord Raeburn who has Annalee, we seem to have finally caught a piece of luck.”

“I don’t know if I’d call it luck,” amended Mrs. Bunn. “He’s a bad ‘un, that one.”

“What do you mean?” asked Danny sharply.

The Bunns looked at each other for a moment; then Mr. Bunn said. “Well, you can’t help hearing things, when you run a public house. And, over the years, people in service up at the Park have told us stories about girls there—girls getting hurt—“

“Beaten,” interjected Mrs. Bunn. “And not for punishment.” She screwed up her mouth, as if to stop herself from saying more. 

“No charges have ever been brought against him,” added Mr. Bunn, but by that point McGarrett was already struggling past Danny’s restraining arms and out of bed. 

He pushed himself to his feet with one smooth motion, but had to grab the bedpost for support.

“Goddamnit, Steve.” Danny gripped his other elbow to steady him. “Lie back down. If you think I tracked you across the Pacific, Asia Minor and half the hellholes in Europe just to see you drop dead in a country pub, you got another think coming. Right, doc?” 

“Commander McGarrett,” Watson told him, “you’re in no fit condition to sit up for dinner, much less undertake some kind of half-cocked rescue mission.”

“Danny,” McGarrett had gotten his balance, and pulled himself gently away from Danny’s hand. He looked far more dangerous than a man in a knee-length flannel nightshirt had a right to look. “Neither of us came all the way from Hawaii to leave Annalee in the hands of a brute. Am I right?”

They stared at each other for a long moment. Then Danny’s shoulders slumped and he made a disgusted sound deep in his throat. “Yeah. Yeah, you’re right. Just—just hold your horses a minute, huh? Let’s figure out what’s going on first, do some reconnaissance? Not just rush in pistols raised—much as I know you like doing that.” He gently pushed McGarrett back onto the bed as he spoke, and McGarrett sat with a suddenness that revealed the effort he’d been expending to stay upright. “There we go. Easy does it.”

From the bed, McGarrett gave them all a wan but disarming smile. “My apologies—I meant to say: Danny’s been telling me all you’ve done for us, and I’m—I’m very—well, I just hope you’ll accept my thanks.”

 

+++

After a hasty conference over Mrs. Bunn’s excellent biscuits, it was agreed that Holmes would reconnoiter Hudders Park, accompanied by Danny, who could identify Annalee should they happen to see her. Mr. Bunn, in whom McGarrett’s tale seemed to have reawakened the martial spirit, offered to accompany them—he knew some of the staff, and could make discreet inquiries. Since one of Bunn’s stable boys had taken milk wagon back to London (along with payment for the extra time it had been away), Mr. Bunn would take them in his own donkey cart.

And so, for the second time in as many days, Watson found himself standing watch over an unpredictable American. This time, however, his job consisted primarily of leaving McGarrett in Mrs. Bunn’s capable hands. Her qualms over his national identity appeared to have been entirely dispelled by his sad but gallant history, and she plied him with tea and broth and then set about getting him washed and shaved without Watson having to lift a finger.

Indeed, when he saw him next, McGarrett was utterly transformed. Mrs. Bunn had found him a thick, high-necked fisherman’s sweater and a pair of old wool uniform trousers. A black watch cap hid the unconventional length of his hair. 

Watson watched him curiously. McGarrett had pulled an old bit of carpet into a corner of the stable yard, and was sitting on it in a complicated cross-legged position, hands cupped open on his knees and his eyes fixed on the middle distance, apparently oblivious to the bustle of the pub life going on around him.

“Cleans up nice, don’t he?” said Mrs. Bunn, appearing at Watson’s side and taking full credit for McGarrett’s rather remarkable good looks. “He could be a Scot, or even a Yorkshire man. ‘S long as he don’t show anyone them tattoos.”

Mrs. Bunn’s relative scale of foreignness was beyond him, but Watson murmured his agreement. “Thank you,” he said. “You’ve been very kind.”

“What do you think he’s doing?” she went on. “Is that how they pray over there?”

“I don’t know,” Watson told her, though in truth McGarrett’s posture resembled things he’d seen among the Indian regiments on the Northwest Frontier, and he remembered Danny’s stories of his travels in the Far East. “You’d best bring him that, though.” He gestured to the heavy jacket in Mrs. Bunn’s hands. “We don’t want him getting chilled.”

+++

Holmes, Danny and Mr. Bunn arrived back a few hours later, brimming with news and energy.

“She’s there, alright,” said Danny, clapping McGarrett on the shoulder. “All we have to do is get her out.”

“Perhaps not in the best shape, though,” amended Holmes, soberly. “As far as Mr. Bunn could ascertain from the servants, a lady of indeterminate origin is lodged in one of the upstairs rooms. No one sees her—Lord Raeburn’s own man takes her all her meals. But they do hear things: sobbing, screams, on occasion.”

“And no one’s tried to help her?” asked McGarrett, looking murderous.

“His Lordship’s made it clear it’s their jobs and references if they do,” Mr. Bunn said grimly. “It’s not the first time this has happened.” 

“Raeburn may not know it yet,” said McGarrett, “but it’s the last.”

+++

As they shared a meal before heading back to the Raeburn estate to await the cover of darkness, Watson broke his own disquieting news. The Baker Street Irregular they’d left keeping watch on Clemmons’s digs had sent word that soon after their escape with McGarrett the gang had started breaking camp. As instructed, he’d sent word to the Yard, which had swooped down in the person of Inspector Lestrade, and scooped up two lackeys and all of the fighters. Of Clemmons himself, however, there had been no sign.

“That son of a bitch,” said Danny, glowering down at his plate of mutton stew. 

“We’ll get him, Danny,” McGarrett told him, laying a reassuring hand on his wrist. “Right after we find Annalee.”

“Are you sure you’re up to this?” Danny returned, eying first McGarrett’s untouched food then his pallid face. “It ain’t gonna be no cake walk—Raeburn has his place sewn up tight. And I know this is the kind of thing you hate to hear, but there’s no way you’re a hundred percent yet. Any way I can talk you out of it?”

“Has that ever worked before?”

Danny grimaced. “No.”

“Then let’s go.” 

+++

Mr. Bunn dropped them half a mile from Hudders Park, with a promise to be waiting for them in same place an hour after the moon rose. Thirty minutes later, faces blackened and covered by kerchiefs, they crouched in the cover of a rhododendron hedge near the tall iron fence surrounding the house, taking stock of the three men stationed along the drive up to the manor. There was no mistaking what they were: armed guards, sporting rifles over their shoulders.

Holmes had been timing their passes along the gravel walk. “Eleven minutes exactly—so if we calculate our approach correctly, we should—“

“I’ve got this,” McGarrett interrupted, and without another word he’d cleared the fence with a leap, a grapple and a neat twist of his hips over the top. He landed with a faint skitter of gravel, but that was enough to alert the nearest guard. The man rushed him, rifle at the ready, but with McGarrett disarmed him with a species of twirling kick Watson had never seen before. He followed it with a blow to the head that left the man unconscious on the gravel. 

“Get him out of sight,” he hissed through the fence at the rest of them.

“What the--? How did he--?” Watson gasped, trying to recreate McGarrett’s effortless vault.

“Yeah,” said Danny, giving him a steadying hand as he landed on the other side. “I learned a long time ago not to ask where Steve learned how to do most of the stuff he does.”

McGarrett was already struggling with one of the other guards. He’d knocked away the man’s rifle, but they’d fallen to ground, locked in hand-to-hand struggle. 

Danny and Watson were rushing to his assistance when Holmes, following behind, shouted “Dogs.”

And indeed, a ball of snarling and growling canine flesh now rounded the house towards them—attack-trained Dobermans, from what little Watson could see in the dark. Without thinking, he drew his revolver and fired into the pack. A sharp yelp rewarded his shot, but at least several dogs kept coming. The hairs pricking at the back his neck, Watson stood his ground, firing two more shots in quick succession. It seemed to do the trick—the pack slowed to a whimpering mass, then turned tail and ran.

Not so the third guard, who came up behind the dogs, rifle raised. 

A bullet whizzed past Watson’s right ear, and he hit the ground cursing. Without lifting his head too high, he tried to see what had become of his companions, but all he could hear were the muted grunts of McGarrett’s continued struggle with the second guard. And the crunching steps of the rifle-bearing guard coming toward him on the gravel.

Then, “Hey, cocksucker,” someone called in distinctly American tones. Watson lifted his head in time to see the shooter glance briefly to one side. In the minute opportunity afforded by this distraction, Holmes tackled him neatly from the other side, cold-cocking him with his pistol butt for good measure. Danny and Holmes shook hands over the fallen body, while Watson picked himself up of the ground and dusted himself off. The three of them turned in time to see McGarrett finish choking his man into unconsciousness. With his thighs.

Watson blinked, and Danny said, “What did I tell ya?” clapping him on the back.

It was about this time that they realized that lights had appeared in the ground floor windows.

In the face of this development, Holmes, whose audacity, as Watson now had cause to remember, easily rivaled McGarrett’s own, elected to knock on the front door.

“My good sir,” he said to the aged butler who opened it. The man was wrapped in a dressing gown and literally shaking in his boots. “We mean you no harm. We have merely come to collect a lady who is being held here against her will.”

The butler made no pretense of ignorance. Nor did he try to prevent their entrance. On the contrary, he opened the door wider and gestured towards the stairs.

Holmes handed him the cloth cap he’d been wearing, for all the world as if he’d come for afternoon tea, and said, “Much obliged, I’m sure.”

A gaggle of other servants, in various stages of undress, watched them warily as they entered the house and mounted the stairs. “Second floor, third door on the right,” one muttered. “Not before time.”

Indeed, only one person seemed inclined to impede their rescue of Annalee, and that was Lord Raeburn himself, who now appeared at the top of the stairway in his smoking jacket, apoplectic with rage. The man looked impossibly dissipated for his age, which Watson put at not much past forty—yellow-skinned and emaciated, and clearly in his cups besides. Only one in three of the words coming from his mouth was comprehensible. “Blackguards,” Watson heard, and “Police,” before he stopped listening to the rant entirely.

“Lads,” said Holmes, clearly enjoying himself. “I believe we brought rope for this purpose.”

“So we did, chief, so we did,” Danny told him.

The entire household staff might very well be without employment on the morrow. But at the moment none of them seemed to consider that sufficient reason to defend their master against four men in masks. A couple of the more likely footmen even stepped up to help.

+++

“Are you sure about not bringing him in on charges?” Danny asked, watching the lord of the manor struggle against his bonds. They’d gagged him with Watson’s scarf, and he was making furious noises through the wool.

“Quite sure,” Holmes told him. “For a man like him, such abuses, heinous as they are, would mean no more than a reprimand. Best simply to remove the lady in question from his clutches.”

Danny shook his head disgustedly. “No offense, fellows, but I guess it’s true what they say about this country. Least we know how to treat men like this in the states.”

“Maybe we can think of another deterrent,” said McGarrett. And with no further preamble he delivered a right hook to Raeburn’s jaw and then wrapped his fingers around the man’s windpipe to bring his face forward again. “If I hear that you’ve done this to another woman,” he hissed, inches from Raeburn’s face. “I’ll make damn sure it never happens again—even if I have to cross every ocean on this globe to find you.”

McGarrett seemed in deadly earnest, and it was with some trepidation Watson touched his shoulder to bring him back to the goal at hand. “Let’s make sure Miss Sneyd is unharmed, shall we?” he said.

+++

Holmes picked the lock of the second-floor room, while the other three hovered over his shoulder. The lady inside, no doubt alarmed by the earlier gunshots and shouting, kept up a steady stream of invective and imprecations, no matter how much they tried to reassure her. It wasn’t a ladylike voice. In their plans to rescue Annalee, Watson had come to think of her as a damsel in distress. The language now emanating from the locked room reminded him that, per Danny’s information, she’d been a high-class whore before she was the Chief Justice’s mistress.

“Stevie,” the lady exclaimed when the four of them burst into the room, launching herself at McGarrett. “I knew you’d come. You were half-dead when they took me, sure, but I knew you’d come.” She patted his face as if making sure he was real, and then pushed him back to arm’s length. “Not that you look much better now. Oh, Stevie.” She drew him close again. “What’ve they done to you?”

She showed the costs of captivity herself: an ugly bruise across one cheekbone and another fading to yellow on the opposite side of her jaw, shadows under her eyes and limbs wasted to th bone. But she was still very beautiful, if older than Watson had imagined—near forty, perhaps. She was also, Watson realized, a native of the islands from which she’d been kidnapped: lustrous black hair spilled loose over her shoulders and all her suffering hadn’t dimmed the warm, even brown of her skin. 

McGarrett gently disengaged himself. “You’re safe now, Annalee,” he said, with awkward though heartfelt tenderness. “No need to fret.”

She saw for the first time that Danny was there, too, and threw herself into his arms, her tears flowing openly. “Danny—how’d you get here too, you big lug?”

Holmes cleared his throat. “Yes, well. I hate to break up this joyful reunion, but it’s probably time we were going. Mr. Bunn will be waiting.”

“Are you all right?” McGarrett asked Annalee. “Can you travel?”

She gave him a look that conveyed the foolishness of the question and pulled a wool wrap around the silk dressing gown she was wearing. “I’d walk on broken legs to get out of this shithole, but yeah, I’m fine.”

Indeed, she led the way back down the stairs, meeting the frank stares of the still-gathered servants with regal, almost contemptuous, dignity. 

“Thank you, my good man,” said Holmes, taking his hat back from the butler. “Apologies for the mess.”

And then they were back out in the cold, clear night, gravel crunching beneath their feet, with nothing left to do but get back to Mr. Bunn’s wagon.

Until, that is, the clatter of hooves announced another party arriving at Hudders Park in the dead of night.

They paused, unsure whether the new arrivals were friend of foe. Even after the three men came into the spill of light from the doorway, it took a moment for them to realize what they were seeing.

“Holy fuck,” said Danny. 

“That bastard. He’s come to steal her back,” said McGarrett. “Can’t leave without his meal ticket.”

But it was Annalee who moved first. “Let me at him,” she screamed, running full tilt at Clemmons. “I’ll kill him with my bare hands.”

It was probably only the suddenness of her attack that saved them. Annalee, fury rendering her oblivious to danger, threw herself at Clemmons, ruining the aim of the pistol he was even then firing into their midst. The shot went wild. Inside the manor, a housemaid screamed.

At that point, things devolved into something of a melee. By rights, Watson realized, his party should have won the field handily—they outnumbered their opponents, even without the redoubtable Annalee. In practice, however, they were hard put to subdue Clemmons and his two toughs. The men, perhaps knowing that only prison awaited them should they fail to get away, fought with dogged ferocity, and it was all Watson and his companions could do to disarm them and prevent their escape.

In the end, they may have only prevailed by dint of Mr. Bunn’s arrival on the scene. Having apparently grown concerned when they did not make their arranged rendezvous, or perhaps having heard Clemmons’s errant shot, he rattled up the walk, donkey cart going at a clip Watson would not have believed possible for the beast, and literally cracked his whip over their heads.

“What’s all this?” he cried, in the booming voice Watson remembered from other battlegrounds. Then he leapt from the cart, literally plucked Clemmons off of a struggling Holmes and said, “I should never’ve let you blighters try this alone.”

That gave them the burst of energy needed to finish the job. In short order, Watson and Danny between them had pinned the biggest of the toughs—no other than Beaver Brows himself—another lay unconscious, and Holmes and Mr. Bunn held the still struggling Clemmons between them.

McGarrett, who seemed to have come to the end of even his extraordinary reserves, surveyed the scene, leaning heavily on Annalee’s supporting shoulder. “I believe there’s no question of handing over these miscreants to the law?”

As a man, they shook their heads.

“Then book ‘em, Danno,” he said, tossing Danny the last of the rope they’d brought. 

Bunn, Holmes and Watson raised their eyebrows. 

“Long story,” said Danny.

+++

“You’ll be interested in this,” said Watson, some months later, happily ensconced in his favorite armchair back at 221b. He heard Holmes pause on his way across the sitting room, but he didn’t lift his head from the evening paper. “Lord Aubrey Raeburn has filed for bankruptcy. He seems to have drained his considerable family fortune in pursuit of a way of life that only the most polite would call dissipated. He leaves no heirs—of the legitimate variety, anyway—and the estate is to be put up for sale. So a sort of justice, after all.”

“Karma, as Commander McGarrett’s Eastern friends would say—simply the workings of karma,” said Holmes, with a satisfied grin. “Speaking of whom,” he dug in his pocket for a much folded envelope, “this came in the morning post.” Watson reached for the letter eagerly, but Holmes seemed to feel it was better read aloud. He cleared his throat, and approximated an American accent:

“Dear Holmes and Johnny:”

“I say,” Watson interjected. Holmes smirked.

__

_Dear Holmes and Johnny: I hope you fellows are well, and the Big Smoke is treating you all right. I can’t say I miss your fogs. I write to tell you we have landed safe in old New York. The crossing was fine. A bit of trouble with pirates off the coast of Newfoundland, but Steve and I saw them off easy enough, with the help of the crew. Guess who ate at the Captain’s table every night after that? You should’ve seen Annalee preen and coo and bat her eyes! She took the first train to Frisco, but I’m spending a few days showing Steve my old stomping grounds. Gladys and Rosemarie—those are my sisters—are having a grand time showing him the sights. Hoping he’ll stay for good—if you know what I mean. But his heart belongs to Hawaii. As does mine, if I’m honest._

_Aloha, boys, as they say in the islands. That means so long, not goodbye, so don’t be strangers. There’ll always be a warm welcome waiting for you on the Jewel of the Pacific._

_Thanks again for everything,_

_Yours truly,_

_Danny Williams._

For a moment or two, they were both lost in fond remembrance of their American guests. Then Watson noticed something.

“Going somewhere?” he asked, taking in Holmes’s short jacket and soft cap.

“To the Punch Bowl, now you mention it. It’s been too long. Fancy a bit of the old sergeant major?”

Watson smiled and folded his newspaper. “Perhaps. But how can I be sure I’ll bet on the right man?”

“My dear Watson,” said Holmes, offering his arm as Watson rose from the chair. “I feel assured your winning streak will remain unbroken.”


End file.
